1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a portable terminal such as, for example, a cellular phone, PDA and smartphone.
2. Description of Related Art
In recent years, portable terminals have increasingly been required multi-functionality as represented by, for example, smartphones. Although some of conventional portable terminals have display units slidably opening/closing only in the direction of the longer sides, such a configuration may face a problem that it cannot be well adapted to functional diversification.
To solve such a problem, Japanese Patent Publication No. 2007-116709 discloses a portable terminal that is laterally foldable as well as longitudinally slidable to meet various functions. FIGS. 8A, 8B and 8C are schematic perspective views, showing a configuration of a conventional portable terminal, where FIG. 8A shows the portable terminal in the closed state, FIG. 8B in an open state after sliding a second casing relative to a first casing, and FIG. 8C in another open state after rotating, with a hinge, the first casing relative to the second casing.
As shown in FIGS. 8A, 8B and 8C, the conventional portable terminal 100 comprises a first casing 110 and a second casing 120. The first casing 110 comprises an upper casing 111 having a front display 113 in the front face thereof, and a lower casing 112 that is mounted to the upper casing 111 and has a rear display 114. The second casing 120 comprises an upper casing 121 having a keypad 123 in the front face thereof, and a lower casing 122 that is mounted to the upper casing 121 and accommodates a battery.
Between the first casing 110 and the second casing 120, a slide module (only a part of which is shown in FIGS. 8A, 8B and 8C) is provided to realize the open states as in FIGS. 8B and 8C. The slide module comprises a hinge member 131 rotatably coupled to hinge coupling section 115 of the first casing 110, a slide member (not shown) to which the hinge member 131 is fixed, and a slide rail (not shown) which the slide member is slidably mounted to and which is fixed to the second casing 120.
With such a configuration, when the portable terminal 100 is used in a communication mode, a part of keypad 123 is exposed (the state of FIG. 8B) with the slide mechanism, and when the terminal is used in a mode for watching a moving image or gaming, entire keypad 123 is exposed (the state of FIG. 8C) with rotation movement with the hinge. Therefore, the conventional portable terminal 100 advantageously meets various functions.